HELP Most fragrant plants,

jackiev938(z7NJ)June 14, 2005

Need some help from you plant experts, i want to have very fragrant plants around my yard, that will survive in zone 7.

I presently have mini china girl liliacs under my windows, but they are so short lived, i would love to have afew gardenias and some vines, jasmine come to mind, but not sure it would survive out winters. Not a big rose fan.

also since i live on a busy corner i'm looking for some pvt. bushes that will remain dense and green year round. I plan on mounding them or berm? to take away from the stripped ground flat development look.

Why not try some tropicals as annuals? Give White Ginger a try. My grandmother grew them in Montgomery, Alabama and just covered the rhizomes with 'pinestraw' if the ground froze. She may have been in zone 8.
kevin

To add to the previous suggestions, you could try Itea virginica (Virginia sweetspire). I saw some for sale last year at one of the local nurseries and was blown away at the cultivar they had that had some waftingly fragrant flowers. Plus it has good fall interest when its leaves color up. You might also want to try some of the hardy southern magnolias that are amazingly fragrant. And if you can find a blooming one and can confirm it has fragrance, the sweet autumn clematis is a good one too. Sometimes the young ones take awhile to become mature enough to bloom and then it might take awhile before exuding their fragrance, but when they are ready, you get a nice late-summer-into-fall white-flowering fragrant vine.

Perhaps star jasmine..I think it's at least hardy to zone 8, but I'm not sure about z7. However, it'd be worth it to try as they can be in bloom for a very long time (from march to november for me) and it's very fragrant all day long. They put out literally hundreds of flowers. They're pretty cheap here, like $4.00 for a gallon size plant. Please try it. :)